Management of the Institute

With her appointment as Professor of Interfacial Process Engineering at the Institute of Interfacial Process Engineering and Plasma Technology (IGVP) at the University of Stuttgart on June 1, 2025, Prof. Dr. Petra Kluger also took over as Institute Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology IGB. Prior to this, the graduate technical biologist spent eight years as Professor of Tissue Engineering and Biofabrication at Reutlingen University. She also gained experience in strategic research management at Reutlingen university, where she was Vice President of the Rectorate from 2018 to 2023. Before her appointment in Reutlingen, Kluger headed the former Cell and Tissue Engineering Department at Fraunhofer IGB. She is strongly committed to teaching and mentoring young scientists and is active in expert committees, including as deputy chair of the German Society for Biomaterials. On January 1, 2026, Prof. Kluger took over as executive director of the institute.

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Dr. Markus Wolperdinger has been director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology IGB since 2018. Wolperdinger holds a PhD in chemistry and has many years of industrial experience in industrial biotechnology, plant engineering and the translation of scientific findings into industrial implementation. His international career has taken Wolperdinger from development, sales and management positions at innovative start-up companies and in medium-sized industry to leading positions in globally operating industrial groups. The focus of his scientific activities is on the interface between biology and process engineering and the transfer of the knowledge obtained to industrial reality. Wolperdinger is active at the state, national and European level in numerous commissions and committees as an expert and reviewer.

Prof. Dr. Steffen Rupp has been deputy director of Fraunhofer IGB since 2015, and since 2019 he has been coordinating activities in the Health business area at the institute. The chemist joined Fraunhofer IGB in 1999, establishing the junior research group "Automated Protein Screening Systems". In 2006, Rupp became head of the new Molecular Biotechnology department. Since 2004, Rupp has been a private lecturer at the University of Stuttgart, and in 2015 he was appointed associate professor of Molecular Biotechnology.

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Dr. Ursula Schließmann was appointed deputy director of the institute in 2022. Since 2019, she has been coordinating activities in the institute's Environment and Climate Protection business area. Previously, the process engineer was head of the Environmental and Bioprocess Engineering Department at the IGB. Among other positions, Schließmann is vice director of the Fraunhofer Innovation Platform Water-Energy-Food Nexus at Stellenbosch University in South Africa and a board member of German Water Partnership (GWP). She is also head of the Fraunhofer Alliance SysWater office. 

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